Z-Library is back, alas

[issybird]

Z-Library officially staged its comeback on public-access Internet—by launching a universal login page and setting up secret personal domains for users.

A Z-Library blog post from Saturday viewed by 21,000 users announced the “great news” and prompted users to access Z-Library using their regular login credentials at a new link. Once users log in, they’re redirected to a personal domain they can use to access close to 12 million free e-books on Z-Library without using encrypted networks like Tor. A second domain is also sent by email. At the time of login, users are prompted to check a box promising, “I will keep my domains in secret.”

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-a-secret-url/

[haertig]

Based on your thread title, this bothers you. Why would you provide a link showing people a path to access this?

This seems really odd behavior, for a moderator especially, since it's almost a ban-able offense to even mention the word "piracy" here, in any context.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by haertig

Based on your thread title, this bothers you. Why would you provide a link showing people a path to access this?

Because it’s news related to ereading. Because anyone who uses such sources would find out, if they didn’t already know. Because I thought it could lead to an interesting discussion about piracy, not advocating piracy. For starters.

This seems really odd behavior, for a moderator especially, since it's almost a ban-able offense to even mention the word "piracy" here, in any context.

From the Guidelines:

discussions or questions about the actions of the Moderating Team are not permitted on open forum

And:

If you have any questions about an action, please address them to the team or other member by Private Message.

And, you’re mistaken. Advocating piracy isn’t allowed here, but we recognize that piracy exists and it can be discussed on that basis.

[Sirtel]

Z-library is and was by no means the only pirate site. There will always be pirate sites. The only way for the pirate sites not to exist would be if there were no demand.

There is no pirate site for ebooks in Estonian language, and that's because most Estonians prefer paper books. There is little demand for Estonian ebooks, so no pirate sites, at least none I have stumbled upon. And of course the market is microscopical, compared to English, German, French and so on.

[haertig]

discussions or questions about the actions of the Moderating Team are not permitted on open forum

Sorry. I did not intend to question your actions. I only intended to respond to the content of a thread, which could have been started by anybody. I did not realize that this was considered questioning your actions. Again ... sorry.

Because it’s news related to ereading. Because anyone who uses such sources would find out, if they didn’t already know.

Thanks for this clarification of posting guidelines.

[ownedbycats]

I saw this article earlier, but the headline "Z-Library returns, aims to avoid seizures..." made me wonder wtf they were doing that induced epileptic seizures.

EDIT: Someone in the comments had the same mistake, lol.

[Cactus Chef]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

I saw this article earlier, but the headline "Z-Library returns, aims to avoid seizures..." made me wonder wtf they were doing that induced epileptic seizures.

EDIT: Someone in the comments had the same mistake, lol.

I told those kids to stay away from the Porygon ebook!

[crudites enjoyer]

I wonder how much they're paying for all those domains...

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by crudites enjoyer

I wonder how much they're paying for all those domains...

That's something I wonder too.

[Sarmat89]

It is good to see them to move to login-only stage. The next one is donation-only, which we know from the example of other such libraries.

[haertig]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

It is good to see them to move to login-only stage. The next one is donation-only, which we know from the example of other such libraries.

This may give pause to some pirates who worry about giving out their email address, if they don't already use untraceable email services. But giving pause to some pirates would be good for book authors and legitimate distributors.

Going to a donation-only model, generally known as a paid model, would be even better for authors and legitimate distributors. A move like this would give pause to even more pirates. And initially may look appealing to Z-Lib. They would be getting money directly from their users, not indirectly from advertisers or whatever supports them currently. However, their user base would go down if things required payment. And an unwanted side effect for Z-Lib would be that their uploaders - the source of their content - would also go down with the user base size. Making a move to donation-only would probably depend on if Z-Lib considers itself a for profit business, or a piracy for the fun of piracy entity. Even if they are for profit, they would have to consider if the decrease in their size - number of users, downloaders mostly - plus the decrease in their uploaders - smaller amount of content - would be worth forcing direct payment from their user base.

Piracy is a difficult thing to contain. Domains can be shut down on the clear web, but there is still the dark web out there. I would guess that Z-Lib's current move to provide a common login page with user-specific "secret" access domains is an attempt to maintain and increase their user base. Because then they have a presence on the clear web. None of this would be needed on the dark web. But there are fewer users there. It appears that a large user base - both downloaders and uploaders - may be of more importance to Z-Lib than the direct income that would come from a donation-only model. But that's only my guess, based on the move they just made.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by haertig

This may give pause to some pirates who worry about giving out their email address, if they don't already use untraceable email services. But giving pause to some pirates would be good for book authors and legitimate distributors.

10-minute mails are a thing.

[maddz]

With reference to piracy of fiction, do away with geo-restrictions, DRM and vendor walled gardens, and I think a lot of reasons for piracy disappear. More will disappear if ebook versions are available as standard when the book is 'in print', and all such ebooks are freely convertible between formats (necessary when you need to use accessibility tools). Also, the price of the ebook should reflect that you are not paying for printing or physical storage and transport costs.

I also think that the price of keeping copyright 'alive' on an edition or work should include offering an ebook version at all times at a reasonable price (so no charging at £25 for mass-market fiction that currently sells at an average of £10). If there is no accessible (i.e. not some obscure language in a remote territory) version available, then the book should revert to worldwide public domain. This might need to be qualified for non-English authors writing in their native language for sale only in their native country, but if you are distributing something worldwide, then there must be an accessible version available worldwide. (Yeah, yeah I know - the dominance of English as a default lingua franca and the colonial legacy thereof.)

I buy books if I want to read them; and I want to read them on a device of my choice regardless of where I purchased them. In some cases I buy an ebook to replace a disintegrating much-loved paperback, or when a book has updated content, or I physically can't hold the paper copy anymore.

I'm not going to get into the arguments pro and con piracy around academic publishing.

[Sirtel]

Copyright should end with the author's death. Why should the author's heirs benefit? They can earn their own wages, just like anyone else's heirs.

Not that it would necessarily lessen piracy, of course.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by maddz

With reference to piracy of fiction, do away with geo-restrictions, DRM and vendor walled gardens, and I think a lot of reasons for piracy disappear.

I think piracy mostly exists because people can and because a lot of people aren’t willing to pay anything at all if they don’t have to. There’s the fallacy that somehow with digital goods people only have to pay what they think they should, as in:

Also, the price of the ebook should reflect that you are not paying for printing or physical storage and transport costs.

This is what I mean. Once costs are covered, it’s demand that sets price. Why should rights holders have to accept a lower price than they can get/that maximizes their profits? But people use this as a justification for all sorts of dubious practices. The price of the paperbook is somewhat irrelevant to the price of the ebook and relevant only to the extent that the two media are fungible for some.

I also think that the price of keeping copyright 'alive' on an edition or work should include offering an ebook version at all times at a reasonable price (so no charging at £25 for mass-market fiction that currently sells at an average of £10).

See above.